Do you ever go to a super pretentious party and they serve weird appetizers that look like cat food on a cracker? I’ve been there. I usually eat it, even if it smells like cat food too. Why not? I’ll eat just about anything, and because I have cats, the cat food smell is nothing new to me. Scotch Eggs Makes: 12 Ingredients:12 quail eggs, hard boiled and peeled1/2 pound low sodium breakfast sausage1 cup seasoned breadcrumbs1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese, dividedsalt and pepper to taste1 quart oil for frying12 wooden cocktail picks Directions: 1.

Spinach and Ricotta Stuffed Shell Recipe. There’s nothing better then making a big batch of stuffed shells and feeding friends.

This Pappardelle Pasta with a Roasted Cherry Tomato Sauce is really beautiful. I feel like this is one of those recipes where you make it the first time you have a boy over at your house and you cook. Simple, no fuss, no screw up, delicious recipes.
Kiwi Capiroska Cocktail Recipe. I had this drink for the first time 7 years ago in Salvador, Brazil.

A capiroska is pretty much caipirinha’s less popular little sister. They’re practically the same drink except a caipirinha is made with cachaca and a capiroska is made with vodka. Now normally even the idea of vodka would make me want to vom (just not a fan), but you can make this drink quite strong without the usual “rubbing alcohol” throat burn. When I ordered the drink I had no idea what I was ordering since the entire menu was in Portuguese, a language I sadly do not speak except for the word “kiwi”.
Fig Tart with Carmedlized Red Onion Recipe.

This is a recipe where figs, goat cheese, and caramelized onions totally fall in love with each other while tucked into a flaky puff pastry shell.

Yea. So I like to imagine eating this love tart while starting into my significant others eyes on the couch while watching Star Wars. But, thats just me. For you, (and me), your significant other could be a computer, or a cat, or a real life human being. Maybe you’re watching Dateline NBC, or a 6 hour black and white silent documentary.
Spicy Blood Orange Champagne Punch Recipe. Hi!

(you can’t tell, but I’m furiously waving at you all with a really huge, borderline creepy smile on my face!) It’s Friday…yay! I could say something totally cheesy and awkward like, “TGIF!!” And go on and on…which is normally my preferred style, but today I’ll spare you all and just try to encourage you to make this drink this weekend. I love champagne, sparkling wine, prosecco, all that stuff…mainly because I love the bubbles and how they tickle your nose for a second right before you take your first or second sip.

The very first time I had REAL tomato-basil soup for the first time at The Noodle Cafe when I was about 12 or 13. This little gem is in a small suburb of Chicago (where I grew up) and to this day it’s still one of my all time favorite restaurants. There are a few reasons for this: 1) The food is amazing.
Pumpkin Risotto with Seared Scallops. Risotto is one of my favorite foods.

EVER. I love it so much because it’s so easy to make and you can add all kinds of things to it. Getting into the spirit of fall, while trying to ignore this totally non-fall weather we’ve been experiencing in L.A. (BOO!) Lately, I decided to make some pumpkin risotto.
Kabocha Ravioli with a Toasted Hazelnut Cream Sauce recipe. Happy Humpday!

To continue our week of winter squash we present you all with this…. KABOCHA.RAVIOLI. My absolute favorite winter squash, the kabocha pumpkin.
Maple Glazed Roasted Acorn Squash recipe. Kimchi Fried Rice recipe. Hi Everyone! I hope you all had a great holiday weekend and that travelling wasn’t too hectic for anyone. I just flew back from Chicago, after spending a whole week at home with my family and I’m still craving my mom’s home cooking.

Galbi Jim. Korean Style Braised Short Rib Stew recipe.
So I’ve had a really busy couple of weeks, well more like a really busy couple of months…and you know what? I’m tired. Really tired.
Baked Egg Boat recipe. Breakfast is my favorite meal. I like to drink iced coffee and watch the cream climb its way down the chunky ice cubes in a dazy before the caffeine hits. I like to order bacon with whatever I’m eating. I like eating potatoes with ketchup.
Baby Chimichanga recipe. It’s Friday…yay! So I know I said that we would be jumping into our Super Bowl fry fest next week, but we got a little excited and couldn’t resist starting a little early….enter baby chimichangas. These little beauties are pretty great; small pockets of fried goodness with a creamy Sriracha-lime dipping sauce.

Home fries. All right, people, time for a confession. This summer, for our third anniversary, our parents bought us a new set of pots and pans from the lovely All-Clad Master Chef 2 series. My last set, also a gift, dated back to 2000 and as much as I loved, loved, loved those Calphalon non-sticks with the clear glass lids, the nonstick was not only wearing off, I was ready to wean myself from it, and the annoying silicon-coated cooking utensils required to keep them intact.

I wanted wooden spoons and metal spatulas and better caramelization in my cooking. I love my new pots and pans, and they do everything good, heavy steel pots promise. Caramel?
Almond-vanilla rice pudding. Can someone explain to me how we can boil some grains, like oatmeal, in milk with a little bit of sugar and mix in some dry fruit and it is called breakfast but when you do it to others, like rice, it is considered dessert?

These are the questions that taunt my brain when I wake up in the morning and realize all I want for breakfast is rice pudding but then force myself to eat “normal” breakfast food like oatmeal or an egg and toast.
Squash and chickpea moroccan stew. Our first night in Paris in October, we had dinner at a great, inexpensive Moroccan restaurant in the 3ème called Chez Omar.
Mushroom bourguignon. When it is as cruelly cold out as it has been this week, beef bourguignon is one of my favorite things.
Whole lemon tart. Cream cheese pound cake + strawberry coulis. Meet my new favorite pound cake.

Watermelon lemonade. Cantaloupe salsa. I wish I could tell you that I’m putting my time into more exciting things* but fact is, it’s nothing but boring stuff keeping me out of the kitchen this week: a new oven that needed installing, pipe work shutting off the water in our apartment today, more doctors appointments than any healthy person should ever require, long classes to teach us the proper diapering of a tiny baby butt, and the kind of steamy heat outside that would make it absurd to turn on the oven anyway (though I should, you know, confirm that it works, right?). Banal, right? But as usual, this has not kept me from bringing home gobs of produce each week.